Mark Rey/Forest Service road management letter 10-4-07

What you don’t know can hurt

In June, Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA) sent a letter to the Forest Service asking some pointed questions about management of their road system (see attachment at bottom of page). In October the Forest Service finally responded to her letter (see attachment). The unfortunate thing is that even though Senator Cantwell asked some very good questions, she didn’t really get many very good (let alone just plain good) answers from the agency.

While, in effect, they provided some type of answer to every question, a couple of things are painfully clear from the memo:

• The Forest Service does not have a good sense of where and how its road system is impacting national forest resources and what it would take to reduce those impacts over the long-term.
• The Forest Service is playing a shell-game with maintenance costs, road classifications and long-term road management, rather than seeking and applying critically needed funding to bring their road system up to minimum water quality or wildlife standards.
• Roads are being indiscriminately closed to address funding shortfalls, not to address resource management needs, potentially increasing both ecological impacts and public anger over access issues.

The bottom line is that an increasing number of roads are receiving a decreasing amount of maintenance, thus exacerbating current and future environmental impacts. The Forest Service road system is woefully underfunded, and rather than seeking significantly increased funds for road management, they are reducing management requirements by reclassifying roads to lower maintenance levels.

The letter to Cantwell also brought up a rather disturbing spin on an issue that we care deeply about. The Forest Service points out that federal regulations (36 CFR 212 A), “require that management of the system of NFS roads be conducted in a manner that is sustainable with current levels of funding from all sources.” The letter then states that it is agency policy to reduce the service level of roads to a level sustainable with expected funding. As more and more of the Forest Service budget has been poured into fire management (just under 50% of the budget currently goes to fire), less and less money is available for everything else the agency must do.

The result? Fewer roads are available for passenger vehicles, and more roads are either closed or open only to high clearance vehicles. The Forest Service estimates that 80% of the use of national forest roads occurs on only about 20% of the roads. As they close roads, and lower maintenance levels, they are coming closer to having only 20% of their overall road system open to passenger vehicles. This would be consistent with use. This sounds good, but of course, there is still a problem. The letter states that, “when current road maintenance budgets are insufficient to meet critical needs, there is no requirement to give priority to critical resource needs…” When the Forest Service closes roads because of maintenance backlogs, instead of managing their roads based on resource and access needs, they only increase the potential for public anger about road closures. If the agency were managing its road system effectively, they could be developing public support for watershed restoration by truly determining the minimum road system needed, and managing their funds and roads to eventually realize that minimum system. Instead, the letter focuses on “forced” closures, and creates a red herring to anger the public with what seems like a “between the lines” attempt to create public backlash and outcry against road closures and restoration.

We agree that the Forest Service should have the right amount of money to fully maintain their road system. But this means increased funding, not decreased road maintenance. The Forest Service is in charge of the largest road system in the world. The bulk of the system is in a terrible state of disrepair, wreaking havoc on America’s natural resources and natural heritage. A significant portion of that road system is no longer needed and can be restored to natural conditions. No matter how you slice it an dno matter how many shell games the agency plays, this will cost money, lots of it. The American taxpayer will pay for these roads, either in a proactive way by preventing new damage by investing in needed maintenance and restoration, or in a reactive way, by paying to clean up the messes, and clean up our water, when the roads fail. Perhaps at some point we’ll see a letter from the agency clearly supporting the kind of investment that is needed to protect and restore our national forests from the long-lasting legacy of a nearly half million mile system of failing roads.

The attached files, below, include:

the response from USDA undersecretary Mark Rey to Senator Cantwell (NFSroadsresponse.pdf)

the original letter Cantwell and others sent to Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns (roads letter Johanns)

an assessment by members of the WWRI of the Rey letter (assessment of FS response to WA roads letter)